Feeling sheepish about diet

Not long ago, I made lamb stew, which we had for dinner one night with homemade biscuits and a salad.

The next thing I knew, he was busy with his cellphone.

“Who are you texting?” I asked.

He snickered.

A minute or two later, my own cellphone rang.

“Are you kidding me?” an outraged but familiar voice said. “Lamb? Do you know how bad that is for you? I don’t know why you even pretend to care about eating decently.”

“I cannot believe you told him,” I said to my husband. “You know how he gets with this stuff.”

“Mom?” my son said. “Have you even listened to anything I’ve been talking about for the last year?”

I paused a minute to think of an adequate defense.

“Well, Dad bought ham,” I countered. “He’s been eating it every day all week.”

My phone went dead.

My husband frowned. “That was unnecessary.”

Eighteen months ago, my children joined forces and turned into the food police.

It started with my son, who became a vegetarian the day after he graduated from college.

I have no idea why these two events were simultaneous, but since he spent the next year living at home while he looked for a job, it translated to a sea change in the family’s eating habits.

Gradually, we stopped making barbecued chicken and chili made with ground turkey and increased our consumption of beans in all forms.

Hummus was the new staple, and there was always a plastic box of fresh spinach in the refrigerator.

A year later, our daughter followed suit, adding a deep suspicion of carbohydrates to her new rejection of meat.

Now one child only drinks rice milk, the other prefers soy, and both are aghast if I even think about making chocolate chip cookies. Quinoa is the grain of choice, with white rice and white pasta reduced to the nutritional equivalent of Styrofoam.

They both take vitamins, with different letter names, and beg for vegetables I last remember getting them to eat when they came in little glass jars with a picture of a rosy-cheeked infant on the label.

Brussels sprouts and sweet potatoes are the new sirloin steak.

Let me rush to say that I have nothing against vegetarianism. After a year and a half surrounded by it, my husband and I have practically become vegetarians ourselves. I believe it makes a lot of sense in many ways, economically, ecologically and nutritionally.

Although I sometimes give in to an overpowering urge for macaroni and cheese, I do know that whole wheat is far preferable in both pasta and bread products, and we have almost entirely made that transition.

We gave up butter a decade ago, drink only nonfat milk and only rarely eat red meat.

Yawn.

No, my problem has to do with the seesawing restrictions that have come with this shift in the children’s diet, restrictions that have multiplied exponentially over time.

There are rules, ironclad ones, and I always seem to be breaking them.

Dairy, which of course includes milk, yogurt and cheese, is now considered a ticket to instant death.

My son only eats cheese on the very occasional slice of pizza in New York, where he now lives. When he is home, he orders it without the cheese entirely. He won’t touch anything else in the dairy family.

When he was home over Thanksgiving, I made egg salad, which he used to love.

“Mom,” he said. “You know I can’t eat that.”

“Why not?” I asked. “They’re organic eggs.”

“Don’t even get me started on eggs.”

I once knew why these were killer foods, but I cannot remember. Given that I have already been told, more than once, I cannot ask again lest I be accused of not having paid attention to the original explanation.

Whatever the food, whatever the discussion at hand, it always comes down to longevity, as in mine will be shorter if I don’t wake up and stop drinking the coffee (also forbidden).